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Mutton Kebobbed

A roasted mutton dish with egg yolk, bread, parsley, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mutton Kebobbed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mutton

  1. Cut the loin of mutton into four pieces.

  2. Oil the skin of the mutton pieces.

  3. Rub them with the yolk of an egg.

  4. Strew grated bread and finely chopped parsley over the pieces.

Roast and serve

  1. Spit and roast the mutton, basting with fresh butter to create froth.

  2. When properly done, serve with sauce ravioli.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Mutton + breadtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,488 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Bread + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,588 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg yolk
Binds the grated bread and parsley to the meat surface and helps them brown.
Grated bread
Forms a crisp, golden crust on the outside of the meat.
Fresh butter
Adds fat and moisture while basting, promoting froth and browning on the surface.

The step that matters

Basting with fresh butter during roasting. Butter must be applied while the meat roasts so it bastes the surface and helps the coating brown and froth. Applying it too late or too little can leave the crust pale and dry.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, egg, bread, butter):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Pepperfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, egg, bread, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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